Ignited Survivor
by RecklessDarkness
Summary: Post-TLJ. After her fall, Phasma is saved by one of her troopers, who runs away with her and helps her recover. But not everyone believes she's dead; bounty-hunters dispute a prize for finding her alive, and as she runs from them, she's forced to face feelings she can't control: can she take another war? Is she ready to let her past go? Would she ever be able to love?
1. Piece Of History

**A/N:** Hey! So, this is a story I've been planning for a long time. Since I've watched The Last Jedi, I wondered how Phasma would survive the fall (and the fire), because - obviously - I believe she's still alive. I've had the idea for this story after knowing she wouldn't be in The Rise Of Skywalker, and this year I finally decided to write it. I hope you like it! You'll get the references better if you've read 'Phasma' by Delilah S. Dawson and the Phasma comics (both Journey to TLJ and Age Of Resistance), but you will understand the story even if you haven't read. Good reading, hope you like it! Oh, and if you want to keep in touch with me, check out my Tumblr account, it's RecklessDarkness there, and the link for it is in my profile :)

* * *

**CHAPTER ONE**

– **PIECE OF HISTORY –**

She felt heavy. Her chest, mainly. No matter how much she tried to breathe, the air just wouldn't come into her lungs, and that was terrific. There was something in her back that she couldn't yet understand what it was, but she felt like it was frozen. She couldn't feel anything else; she reached for moving her arms and legs, but it was like they weren't there. Everything seemed so paralyzed and cold that it was like her body was dead.

But there was something she could hardly feel – not much, far away, but yet it was noticeable, and it was coming along the lack of air in her chest… Slowly and softly… _Burning._

"_Get help! Somebody get help!_"

As soon as the words sounded in her head, she felt the air entering her lungs all at once, and suddenly the heaviness broke in a million pieces, she felt her whole body like it was hitting the ground after a free fall, and the burning became almost unbearable.

Phasma opened her eyes, and a white light stroke into her corneas and she couldn't avoid it, because an acute pain collapsed into her back, which was still paralyzed. For a moment, she couldn't gasp for air again, and her heart raced unstopping, and yet she couldn't move straight. It ached. And after some seconds she realized: she could only see the white light on her right side.

"Captain?"

That voice, it was not unknown, Phasma remembered it, it was the same one screaming in her head seconds ago… Female, high, sounding somewhat scared…

Finally, Phasma got to see a white roof with a lamp turned on. She tried to look around but her neck wouldn't move, and all in her left was black. She moved her right eye then, and all she could see was a small room with some metallic instruments upon a table, and some lockers on the walls, which were light grey. What was that place? It didn't look like the _Supremacy_, that's for sure. She tried to move again, but one more time, she couldn't. Was she restrained, by chance? No, whatever was preventing her movements felt internal, her body seemed not to respond to her commands.

"Don't try to move, don't try–" the voice stopped at the moment Phasma finally spotted a figure coming her way, and then it turned out to be a woman.

Her skin was light but her hair was brown, very dark, and so were her eyes. Phasma could see her whole face because her hair was very short – she seemed worried, it was visible in her delicate features. She was somehow… Familiar…

Phasma took a quick breath to talk, but when she contracted her throat to speak, nothing came out. That's when she finally realized: there was something inside her mouth, and when she moved her eye down, she saw an oxygen mask on her face.

Her body was still not responding, so she looked at the woman again "Can you hear me?" she asked. Phasma blinked confused, trying to see all around but failing. What was happening there? She couldn't remember anything, the last thing coming to her mind was returning from Luprora, capturing FN-2187 in the _Supremacy_, sentencing him to death, and then… "Let me take that out of your mouth…"

The woman walked to Phasma and held the mask with her hands. She was wearing a black t-shirt and grey pants, the Captain paid attention to that before she felt the plastic coming out of her mouth, and it hurt like hell.

Phasma coughed, not once nor twice, but many times. She felt her lips dry and her throat burning just like her whole body, mainly the left side of her face. "Do you recognize me?" the woman asked again, and Phasma looked at her, trying to remember where she'd seen her before, but she continued before she could "I'm SR-1134..."

The acronym wasn't new for Phasma. Yes, she remembered SR-1134, she'd seen her a couple of times among the troopers in the _Finalizer_ and in the _Supremacy_, but not much...

Again, Phasma tried to talk and failed, which lead her to cough once more. Her face hurt more whenever she did that.

"Don't rush to talk, you inhaled too much smoke..." said SR-1134, and when Phasma heard that, something strangely – and suddenly – came to her mind.

Fire. A lot of fire.

Striving the most she could, feeling her throat burn like it was washed with acid, she looked at the trooper and asked, only with her lips' movement, because her voice wouldn't sound:

"What happened?"

* * *

ON THE _SUPREMACY_:

There was fire everywhere.

No matter how much she ran, SR-1134 couldn't find anywhere that wasn't consumed by the flames. On the floor, bodies over bodies of her fellow troopers were abandoned, melting and turning into ashes faster than she could see. She didn't want to be the next, no she didn't. And she could still hear the shots not too far. It was all lost now – all that's left was running away.

She'd served as a TIE pilot not long ago, and although it was never her specialty, she still remembered how to fly. Fast and agile, she ran through the flames and tried to follow a safe route, as hard as it might be. However, it was hard to see where she was going, and when she got some view of where she was, she was paralyzed – only a few yards away, a young man with a First Order officer uniform was holding a retractable baton in the air, and then hitting with it hardly in a hard metallic surface, hard enough to crack it.

The surface of Captain Phasma's helmet.

At the same moment, SR-1134 got back and luckily there was a small piece of the cracked floor right at her side, so she hid behind it. But she kept on looking, by its corner, only to see Captain Phasma falling into a hole on the floor, the flames all around still burning, and then, SR-1134 heard the sound of the ground breaking down.

She had the impulse to run, but her muscles were too rigid and paralyzed for it. The flames increased in the hole opened yards away from her, and she felt her heart racing even more. For a moment, everything seemed to be silent, all she could hear was the fast beating of her heart. The young man left in some seconds, along with a girl SR-1134 hadn't even seen, and suddenly, she was alone there, with only the sound of the fire, and that last vision echoing in her head.

There was too much fire, and the fall was too big. Captain Phasma wouldn't make it… But her armor would protect her, sure it would, she might… She couldn't be dead. No, she couldn't, and obviously, the First Order was way too busy right now to look for her in the middle of the wreckage, but what had happened that day was the purest proof that the First Order would soon be gone, so it was pointless to wait for them. No, SR-1134 had to do that on her own, she couldn't let that happen.

She couldn't let Captain Phasma die.

Getting up from the floor the fastest she could, she ran through the bodies and the flames, desperately looking for a way to go to the lower floors of the big ship. It was all broken now, it was hard to even walk, let alone run, but she had to try. When she reached the inner hallways, she saw people all around running as well, frightened, in pure panic, and she actually thanked for that, because in such a horrific situation, no one paid attention to what an insignificant stormtrooper intended by running all the way downstairs, until the last floor, which she reached in a minute that passed like an hour.

It would be completely dark down there if it wasn't for the fire that was consuming the whole _Supremacy_. Luckily for SR-1134, there was a lot of light coming from it, so she could see, among the many overused TIE Fighters that were on storage there, waiting to be recycled, the chrome reflecting the firelight.

SR-1134 ran towards the reflecting red and orange, removing her helmet to see straight, although it was hard to breathe there because it was too hot and all the smoke made it unpleasant to say at least, but she went on, and when she reached her Captain, her heart nearly stopped.

Captain Phasma's armor was hot on the outside, you could feel that it had just left the fire, and all the fabric underneath it was burnt, some parts of it still with some flames left, making SR-1134 panic. "Captain!" she screamed repeatedly but got no answer. Captain Phasma's helmet was broken on the left side, and SR-1134 couldn't help but look inside of it – the Captain's face was a mix of blood and ashes, and you couldn't see her eye, because it was too covered by all of it. Trembling, the trooper kneeled aside her fallen leader and desperately touched the side of her neck.

_Please, beat, please, all I need to hear is a small pulse…_

In the first seconds, she couldn't feel anything, which almost made her own heart stop again, but then, with her shaking fingertips, she felt, far away, a solid heartbeat. But it wasn't strong, it was like it was fading away faster than she could think.

It was just a matter of time.

Still trembling and with a fast and hoarse breath, SR-1134 didn't allow herself to think too much; she just grabbed Captain Phasma by her two arms, with all the strength she'd gained within all the years of training, and drag her to one of the TIE Fighters, which she thought she wouldn't be able to open because her arms were shaking uncontrollably, but adrenaline did its part, and she got to put Captain Phasma inside the small ship, and after closing its door again, she went to the pilot's seat.

"It's gonna work, it has to work…" SR-1134 repeated to herself, because she had to make her mind believe that, otherwise, it would all be lost, and she couldn't let it be lost. She knew there was still energy in those almost recycled ships, so they'd be able to fly, but it would be pointless if the ship was already too broken to make the trip. Trip to where, she didn't know – all she knew was that she had to get out of the _Supremacy_.

For SR-1134's biggest luck, the ship turned on after a few seconds, and she could barely feel her own movements when she launched, leaving the fire and the wreckage of the _Supremacy_ behind.

Her heart raced so fast now that she felt like it could tear up her chest at any moment, but still, she went on, flying that ship as if her life depended on that, because, in fact, it did – not her life, but Captain Phasma's. She'd felt that her pulse was weak, it wouldn't make it far. She had to be fast, the fastest she could, because whatever trip she was going to make now would be long if she wanted to go far away from that system.

After getting out of the _Supremacy_ through one of the enormous holes in its surface, SR-1134 reached space and took a deep breath not to lose her thinking: where in the Galaxy could she go? Where in the Galaxy would she find help? If the First Order found her, she'd be considered a traitor; the right thing to do would be taking Captain Phasma to the _Finalizer_ or the _Absolution_, for her to be treated in its med bays. But how long would this be considered safe? If the First Order fell, and it probably would… What would happen to Captain Phasma? What would happen to _her_, an insignificant stormtrooper who had just broken all the rules she swore to follow?

No, she couldn't take the risk. She knew that disabled people – leaders included, even if just for a short time – were useless to the First Order. And so were stormtroopers, if they didn't follow the exact orders they received. In the depth of her desperate thoughts, SR-1134 realized that she only had one option, indeed: flying that sheep the farthest she could, to a place where she could get Captain Phasma some medical assistance, because she'd die if she didn't get it.

SR-1134 thought of the planets she knew that were far from the system they were at. As a pilot, she knew some, but not much. A lot of planets in the Unknown Regions or even in the Outer Ring were used as gun storage, but the First Order would find them easily on those. But planets without much technology wouldn't have the medical supplies Captain Phasma needed, and certainly wouldn't have someone who knew how to use them either. Perhaps she could go to Kessel… But that planet was way too crowded and received every kind of alien from all over the Galaxy. Easy to hide for common people, but not for a famous First Order Captain. It wouldn't work.

That was when she remembered: Lah'mu. It was an agrarian planet far from everything the First Order would ever care about, and according to what she remembered from what she'd learned in her training, it had a scarce population, but a certain level of technology. Maybe it would be enough to save a life. Right now, she had to believe it would be, because she couldn't think of anywhere else, and there was no time to wait for her memory to work better.

Doing her best not to lose control, SR-1134 looked in the TIE Fighter's maps for the localization of Lah'mu and prepared to jump to hyperspace. With the corner of her eyes, she looked through the glass and saw the remnant of the _Supremacy_. At that distance, she could see that the ship was cut in half, with its pieces floating all around it, and the flames still burning. How it had happened and why was a mystery. For a short moment, while the ship collected the last seconds of energy it needed to jump into hyperspace, SR-1134 could feel a tear falling down her cheek, for all she'd ever known and fought for was now gone forever, and disappearing into the big Galaxy was scary. But she'd have to do this. She'd have to start a new life.

Finally, the TIE Fighter jumped, and all she could see were the stars turning into soft scratched lines in the infinite black.

SR-1134 turned around and left the pilot's seat to go to Captain Phasma again. Still shaking a little, she touched her neck again to check her pulse. It was weaker, but still there. Looking at her white gloves, she noticed some blood upon them. She'd rather not realizing that it came from the Captain's neck, which was burnt underneath the black rubbery fabric that had melted generously. The trooper closed her eyes for a moment, noticing that her heart still raced, and even if she intended to open them again, she didn't.

The last time she'd seen Captain Phasma was before Starkiller Base had been destroyed. Actually, a way before, since she had never gone to the base herself. She used to serve on the _Supremacy_, and rare times on the _Finalizer_, so the two of them didn't see each other often. She knew the Captain memorized every trooper's number, but she'd probably not recognize her. SR-1134 wasn't important, she'd never been. She'd trained since her early childhood to be the best trooper, but so had all the other children who were on the _Absolution_ under Captain Cardinal's command. Some of them became Sergeants, others became officers. She, however, had become just a regular trooper, and so it had been for 28 years. Thinking straight, she was lucky to be still alive. Even luckier now, for being at the right place at the right time when the First Order started to collapse.

At least, she'd do something useful.

It was after a time she couldn't measure, because even if it were seconds, in her desperate thoughts it would feel like hours or even days, she felt the TIE Fighter finishing the jump, and the atmosphere of Lah'mu appeared through the ship's front window. SR-1134 checked Captain Phasma's pulse again, and once she made sure her heart was still beating, she went to the pilot's seat and started controlling the TIE Fighter for landing. She didn't know where exactly to land, so she entered the ringed planet's atmosphere and overflew it for a couple of minutes, until, in the middle of the black sand and the lawns, she spotted a group of small buildings some miles away.

Taking a deep breath, SR-1134 flew low until she softly reached the ground, getting close to the buildings and seeing, through the window, people coming from all over what seemed to be a village when she finally landed in the entrance of it. She didn't wait – the fastest she could, she went out of the ship and screamed. "Help! Somebody get help!" as soon as she reached the ground, she saw that people were coming her way, and some of them were holding blasters.

"Stop right there!" a man shouted. SR-1134 did exactly what he said. All of them wore simple clothes, some of them even a little bit dirty with sand. From what she'd heard from Lah'mu, it was a planet of farmers. But they had blasters, so they might have some medical technology and droids as well. "Are you from the First Order?"

It was only at that moment that SR-1134 remembered she was still wearing her stormtrooper armor, even if without her helmet, and she'd arrived in a First Order TIE Fighter. "Yes… I mean, no," she gasped "You don't have to worry about us, we're not armed, we mean you no harm!"

"Us?" asked another farmer, a woman, this time, also holding a blaster "Who else is with you?"

"My Captain…" SR-1134 replied, feeling her heart racing when she thought that Captain Phasma might only have a few more minutes of life. There'd be no time to explain the whole story "She's seriously wounded, we need your help–"

"What's going on here?" the male voice interrupted SR-1134, making her nervous. It had come from the middle of the grouped people, and in some seconds the trooper saw an old man appearing among them, and walking towards her. His hair was grey and he walked somewhat slowly, but he had a strong gaze in his greeny eyes, which were focused on her now "Why does the First Order send their troopers to a farm village?"

"The First Order didn't send me, I'm not with them anymore," SR-1134 explained. "I need your help, we don't have much time… Is there any doctor in your village?"

"I'm a doctor, child," the old man said, making the trooper breathe as relieved as if she'd waited years without gasping for air. "What's wrong with you?"

"It's not me, it's my Captain," said SR-1134. "She fell from the high, and our ship was on fire, she's unconscious and her pulse is weakening…"

The old man kept on looking at the trooper, but before he could say anything, the man who'd talked first argued. "Hectre, you know who she's talking about, they'll certainly come to look for her–"

"They won't!" SR-1134 interrupted. At that moment, tears fell from her eyes again. "The First Order is coming to an end, they won't waste time looking for her. We're on our own now, and she needs help!"

She didn't intend to cry, but she couldn't help herself. She looked at all those people, men, women, even children, and none of them said a thing, at least until the old man, Hectre, asked. "Please, bring the litter here, and prepare the med bay."

SR-1134 closed her eyes in relief. Her tears burned her corneas underneath her eyelids, but she didn't care. "Thank you, sir…"

"Don't thank me yet," it was all Hectre said, and after that, some of the people ran to a specific building, in the center of the village, and came back with a white and blue litter. "Take me to her, child," the trooper obeyed at the exact same moment, opening the TIE Fighter's door so that the men and women who walked to there with Hectre got to take Captain Phasma out and put her upon the litter, and that was when the doctor looked at her for the first time. For SR-1134's despaired, he seemed shocked, mainly when he too touched her neck. "Her heart's about to stop, take her to the med bay, now!"

All the relief the trooper was feeling was broken in a million pieces at that moment. In a second, she felt her panic tears coming back to her eyes, but no matter how wet they were, she could still watch Captain Phasma being taken by the people to the house in the center of the village, to which SR-1134 ran quickly, passing through some rooms she didn't pay attention to, and finally reaching a little med bay.

It was nothing but a simple room with grey walls and some litters stationed in specific places, aside from where they put the one Captain Phasma was upon. There were instruments and devices in some tables, and some lockers too, but she didn't pay much attention to that either. The whole rest of the village seemed to be outside that building waiting for what was going to happen, but inside there, there were only three men and a woman, alongside Hectre.

He quickly ripped off a piece of fabric that was still covering Captain Phasma's neck and ignored her burnings to inject something into her veins, while one of his assistants brought a device and connected it to her. A hologram appeared aside the litter, then, and SR-1134 quickly realized it was a heart monitor. However, he showed a heartbeat too weak to be from a living being.

"Give me more to inject!" Hectre ordered, and SR-1134 trembled without any control of herself when the monitor started making alert noises, noises she didn't want to hear, because she knew that, if they became silent, she'd done it all for nothing.

The woman gave Hectre a new injection, and he applied it to Captain Phasma's neck one more time. SR-1134 closed her eyes and cried, holding onto the last hope she had, the noises still echoing, and then, they were silent for a second. The trooper couldn't open her eyes, she could hear her bones shaking and her tears falling, but then, suddenly, the monitor made another noise. And it repeated, in a regular time interval.

SR-1134 could finally breathe again.

"It was close," Hectre said when the trooper opened her eyes to dry her tears a little. She actually hurt her eyelids with the roughness of her gloves, but she didn't care. "Now let's take a look at the damage."

While SR-1134 strived to make her heartbeats go back to normal, she came closer to the litter and watched Hectre and three of his assistants start removing Captain Phasma's armor. The chromed parts were not that hard, but when they got to the rubbery fabrics, the trooper felt her nose being infected by the smell of blood. And her stomach twisted when they pull the fabrics out, revealing several burnt blisters and pieces of melted skin.

"You don't have to look at it if you don't want to," Hectre told her. The trooper seriously considered running out of that room and throwing up elsewhere, but she stopped herself. She _had_ to stay.

"Don't worry, I'll be fine," she replied. Hectre nodded, waiting while his assistants removed every fabric from Captain Phasma's body, which was burnt in pretty much everywhere the chrome didn't cover, mainly her face, SR-1134 saw that when they took off her helmet.

For a moment, she kept on staring at that face she had never seen before. She might have been surprised to see the light blonde hair, and the pale skin, or even the strong, however gentle, features of the Captain's face, about which she'd heard speculations inside the First Order ships pretty much her whole life. Why would Captain Phasma always hide her face? Would she be too ugly or monstrous to show her true self? SR-1134 had never believed that, and now she had the proof she was right. Yes, she could have paid attention to all that, but she didn't – all she could look at was the red and black burn that covered the left side of Captain Phasma's face.

Hectre slightly touched it to examine it, and then turned to SR-1134. "Her eye is blinded."

The trooper sighed deeply. "You can't save it even with bacta?" she asked.

"We don't have bacta here," said Hectre. "If you wanted high medical technology, you should've gone somewhere in the Colonies or the Core, not the Outer Rim…"

"I couldn't. They'd find us if I went anywhere too populated or visited. It was too dangerous to take the risk–"

"So this is what you got," Hectre interrupted, and at the same time, his fourth assistant brought him a portable scanner, which he turned on and slid some centimeters away from Captain Phasma's body. Quickly, another hologram appeared, showing a human skeleton with some signs in red. In fact, many signs.

"What does that mean?" SR-1134 asked. Hectre took a deep breath.

"Twenty-seven broken bones…" he slowly said, still staring at the hologram. "Fractures in three vertebrae–"

"Disabling fractures?!" SR-1134 inquired.

"I think not…" Hectre replied. "But it's far from being fast healing, too," SR-1134 closed her eyes to sigh. She didn't know if she was relieved or worried now. "Third-degree burns, and soot in her throat and lungs," the elder doctor turned to the female assistant. "Put her on an oxygen mask and minister anesthetics. We'll keep her asleep for some time, and clean the lungs when we get to wake her up. The rest of you, go get some herbs for the burns," While the assistants left, SR-1134 watched the woman putting the inner part of a big oxygen mask inside Captain Phasma's mouth, leaving the outer part upon her nose and chin. The trooper knew nothing about medicine, but maybe it would help her breathe, since Hectre had said her lungs were damaged too. After the woman finally walked away, the doctor turned to SR-1134. "It's a serious situation. I'll do whatever I can, but as I told you, we've got limited access to medical supplies."

"Well, you saved her," said the trooper.

Hectre sighed. "She'll wish I hadn't."

After she heard that, SR-1134 was quiet for a minute. Has she done the right thing, really? How much would Captain Phasma suffer from now on? Would she ever be the same as before?

"I didn't ask your name," Hectre took her out of her thoughts.

"SR-1134," she replied.

"Well, I think no one here will be comfortable with calling you a number," the elder doctor told her. "You have a long stay ahead of you, so maybe we can call you… Sarii. Is that okay for you?"

"Call me whatever you prefer, it's fine," the trooper answered, the most honest she could. "And why do you say I have a long stay ahead?"

Hectre took a deep breath. "Your Captain will need a very long time to recover. This _if_ she recovers."

"She will. She's the strongest person I've ever seen, trust me," SR-1134 hoped. Suddenly, a memory came to her mind. "Once, when I was still a teenager, we went to battle and she was hit in the head by a double blaster shot. Many of us troopers were punished for letting it happen, I still don't know whose fault it was, but I watched her being taken to our ship's med bay, and I heard she went through some kind of surgery. The fact is: she was fighting again two days later."

Hectre didn't seem much impressed by that. "We've heard of her here. We live pretty much isolated, but we have some contact with the rest of the Galaxy, enough to know about the First Order and its leaders… I'm impressed you brought her with you when you ran away."

"Why?" asked SR-1134.

"Let's just say she's not famous for being fair and humble," Hectre replied.

SR-1134 looked down. "Will your people mind that she stays here? That we stay here?"

"If you don't bring trouble with you, they've accepted you when I accepted to treat her. Welcome to our village, Sarii."

Again, the trooper looked down. _Sarii_. It didn't sound bad. She'd always dreamed of having a name… "Thank you, sir…" she said.

"Please, just Hectre. Now let's leave her for now. You must be tired and hungry," the doctor said, walking to her and giving her Captain Phasma's helmet, which she held softly, cause her hands had just stopped trembling. She stared at it, and it reflected her worried brown eyes almost perfectly.

Whatever happened next, at least she knew she hadn't failed at one thing: saving her Captain's life.

* * *

Phasma was staring at SR-1134, her nostrils and throat still burning to breathe, and the burning in the rest of her body kept on torturing her while the trooper finished talking.

"…they agreed to shelter us, and Hectre will treat you until you're fine again," she said. "But, as I told you, he said it will take long…"

For the first time since SR-1134 had started telling her what happened in the _Supremacy_, Phasma looked away and tried to look at her body for a single second. Right now, her intimacy was covered with white fabric, and the parts that burned, with a green and black herb.

Cold as she was known to be, she moved her lips without making sound again. "We cannot stay."

"Captain, you're wounded, we have nowhere to go–" said SR-1134.

"The First Order will come for me." Phasma silently said again, serious.

"I'm afraid they won't…" when the trooper said that, for some reason, Phasma felt too much conformity in her voice. That was not what she expected to hear. SR-1134 breathed for a second and then talked again. "The First Order suffered great losses after that battle… The stories are told all over the galaxy, even here in Lah'mu…" she stopped again, but Phasma kept on staring at her, forcing her to continue "You've been asleep for fifteen days now, Captain. The First Order… They already held a symbolic funeral for you."

At that moment, Phasma felt something she'd rarely felt before her entire life: she was static and speechless. How could SR-1134 know that the First Order had done that? In that isolated agrarian corner of the Galaxy? But why _wouldn't_ they do it? They hadn't found her… Or, well… They hadn't even looked for her. And the trooper had said they were losing. Although Phasma didn't want to accept that, it seemed like the Resistance would be the winner in the end.

And she was now officially a useless piece of the Galaxy's history – the memory, that no one would remember in a short time, of the great Captain of the First Order.

* * *

**A/N:** So, what do you think? Did you enjoy this chapter? Did you like Sarii? She just gained her new name and I can't help but calling her by it! Please, leave a comment to tell me your opinions about the story so far! Feel free to tell me anything you feel like! See you in the next chapter, may the Force be with you all!


	2. The Jewel

Hey, guys! Yes, it's been forever since I posted the first chapter, but here's the second! Don't you worry, I'm really not abandoning this story. This chapter was hard to write, so it took me time, but I did my best for it to be nice for you guys to read. Hope you enjoy it! Have a nice reading!

* * *

**CHAPTER TWO**

– **THE JEWEL –**

2 YEARS LATER

ON LAH'MU

The mornings in Lah'mu started very cold, for the sun took long to rise, so the shadows took over the western hemisphere of the planet, where its scarce population lived. However, when the sun was up, the weather got warmer, and it lasted until the night because the sunset happened late. After that, it turned cold again. The days were not the longest, but they were enough for farmers to work in their plantations, which were not big, but got to feed the whole village. The routine was simple there, nothing too special, mainly because something new happening was rare. It was pretty much the same every day.

In fact, the last unusual thing that had happened on that planet was a TIE Fighter coming from the sky and bringing two First Order servants running from the downfall of the organization, which they did right in time.

Right now, it'd been almost one year since the First Order had lost the war and been destroyed for good.

The Galaxy was in peace. The New Galactic Order had been created to rule democratically over it, and take care of the war's aftermath. And it had been a big war. Even in Lah'mu, a planet far away from everything, the news came about what happened after what was named the Battle of Crait, where the Resistance was reborn from the almost-sure defeat and, among the next whole year, had battles after battles against the First Order, until they finally won. Honestly, it seemed weird to think it had happened, because the truth was that the First Order had much more forces than the Resistance, even if it had suffered a huge attack on the _Supremacy_ – and on Crait, apparently – it was much more organized, structured, and powerful. Troopers and officers might have doubted it because of what happened in the _Supremacy_, but Phasma knew it was true. And yet, the First Order had lost.

And, yet, there she was, watching everything happen from far away, and no one had the slightest idea that she was there.

"…_I brought you here because I didn't feel it was safe to take you to the _Finalizer_ or the_ Absolution_… If the First Order lost, what would they do to you? It was a possibility I couldn't ignore..._" SR-1134 had said on that same day in which Phasma had woken up. Or better, _Sarii_, that's how the locals had decided to call her, she'd said that too. Not that it made any difference to Phasma. She didn't care about how her former trooper was called now that she was no longer a trooper. She didn't care much about her intentions for bringing her to Lah'mu either. Had she saved her life? Yes, the Captain would probably be dead if it wasn't for her. But when she felt fully awake and realized how painful her body was and how impossible it seemed to move, she incredibly wondered if it had been worth it in the end.

Mainly when the local doctor, Hectre, came to explain to her all of her injuries, which were more than she could count.

"_First of all, don't try to talk or move,_" he'd said. "_You're pretty much all broken up, and there's soot in your throat and lungs. We didn't have the right instruments to clean it up with you asleep, so there was only one option: controlling the infection with meds until we could wake you up for you to help me clean it._"

When he said that, Phasma couldn't imagine how painful it would be to 'clean it'. It was the first thing Hectre did: put a device inside both of her nostrils to suck the soot out of her system. All she had to do was keep on breathing normally through her mouth – which was everything but easy. But she did it anyway. It hurt like hellish torture, much like being drawn into boiling water. Those were seconds that lasted like hours, and not just once, because no one would take that without an interval. When the device was removed from her nose for the second time, Phasma couldn't help but cough hardly.

"_You were great,_" Hectre said. Phasma was barely listening, because her coughs were keeping her busy at the moment. "_It's almost all clean. Just o more time and we're done._"

Of course she'd have to go through that one more time. Unable to talk, she just blinked to sign she'd understood, and Hectre restarted the procedure. Sarii was there the whole time, from the beginning to the end of it. There was a kind of sorrow in her eyes, something that Phasma hated to see. She didn't need anyone's pity. Just they wait, she'd get up from that bed and seek revenge.

Yeah, that's what she thought. However, getting up from that bed would be far from easy, and even farther from fast.

Hectre kept her on painkillers, but, on the first night, she cried for how much her body ached. The broken bones, the burns, and mainly, the spine. Phasma didn't remember the last time she'd cried. It'd probably happened past ten years ago, when she was suffering hard sexual abuse in the hands of Brendol Hux. In the end, her last tears had been of joy, on the day he was declared dead, and she knew she'd been the one who'd brought death to that bastard, although the whole First Order believed he'd just gotten ill, except her and Armitage, who'd helped her in her revenge.

But back then she was walking. She could move, she could see with her two eyes. How would she ever get revenge on FN-2187 now that all of that seemed to be gone? In fact, even Armitage was gone, she'd come to know that eventually.

Phasma slept alone in the med bay, so no one saw her crying. As she couldn't eat at first, Sarii came every day to give her liquid proteins to keep her fed up, twice a day. It tasted horrible, but Phasma tried not to care. No matter what she would do later on, she had to strengthen herself now.

A couple of days later, Hectre took a careful look at Phasma's spine, with the help of a scanner and a droid. He tried to move her in the litter, and she felt the worst pain when he did. "_Is your back aching?_" he asked. Phasma looked around with her right eye, only to check if two of Hectre's assistants – and Sarii, of course – were still there, and they were. "_Don't play the tough girl, I need to know: is it aching or not?_" she hated that question. Completely against her will, she blinked slowly so that the doctor would know the answer was 'yes'. "_It's worse than I thought._"

"_What do you mean?_" Sarii asked, in the corner of the room.

"_She shouldn't be feeling pain with such a slow movement at this point,_" Hectre replied. "_It indicates that her vertebrae are not healing in the speed I believed they would_."

This wasn't something Phasma wanted to hear. Not at all. She moved her eye to the doctor, trying to inquire how long would it take for her to walk again, but he was looking at Sarii, not at her.

"_And how long do you think it will take her to go back on standing and walking on her own?_" Sarii asked again. At least, it seemed like she'd read Phasma's mind at that moment.

Hectre just sighed worriedly. "_Only time will say for sure, but judging by the pain she felt right now, I'd say a year, more or less,_" and of course, that was something else Phasma did not want to hear.

The days passed slowly for her inside that med bay. She could hear the sounds of the village out there as clear as the silence of the night, which was rare in the First Order ships. She was also not used to natural light anymore, and she could see some of the sunlight through the small windows close to the roof of the med bay. At first, she didn't wish to see more of it, but as time passed, the desire for fresh air became almost unbearable. She never wished for a tranquil life in a farm village, of course not, but she'd been raised in battlefields, and that made her crave for a baton in her hands, for the sweat dripping down her blonde hair and wetting her face to the point of making her eyes burn. It made her crave _fighting._

Eventually, after her lungs and throat were clean, her voice came back to normal, which made her life at least a little bit easier, because she could talk when she wanted to ask for food or for things that people who ate regularly needed to do. Sarii was the one who generally brought the food, but when it came to biological needs, the caretakers were always Hectre and his female assistant. The first bath came only after past a month, and it was a terrible thing, not exactly because the burns ached – and they did – but because you couldn't do much by yourself to clean your body when you couldn't even move.

Phasma started feeling her limbs again after some time. Not that she didn't feel them before, but it was impossible to make any move with them. And when the first moves came, they came with pain. The simplest making fists cause a twinge on her spine, which, although already healing, was still wounded, as well as all the twenty-seven bones that were still partially broken. As months passed, Hectre said that both were going better than he expected, but Phasma still wondered, alone at night, how long it would take for her to be the same as before. That is, if she ever got to it.

The first time she left the med bay was after that, when the burns healed enough to be resistant to infections and bacteria from the outside. Her spine was still injured, though, and some bones hadn't yet mended, so she was taken outside seated on a moving chair, which Sarii conducted. Hectre had taught her to do so. The first place she took Phasma to was the main garden of the village, where she said the farmers used to hold meetings and celebrations. "_They know you're coming out today, and they've been curious about you for a long time now…_" Sarii said. "_They might come to talk, or–"_

"_I'm used to strangers coming to see me, don't worry. I'm not afraid of people,_" Phasma interrupted. It wasn't completely true, though. Being seen in a bright shiny armor by everyone was different from being the wounded and almost disabled woman who couldn't even walk. For Phasma's annoyment, Sarii seemed to know how she felt deep inside, and that's precisely why she'd said that.

"_Well…_" she said. "_At least there's one good thing in the main garden: a holocaster."_

"_And why do you think that's good?_" Phasma asked.

"_At least we'll get to know what's happening in the galaxy,_" Sarii replied. Phasma said nothing else. Honestly, she had no interest in seeing the news from the rest of the galaxy, from the First Order or the Resistance. At least not until she was back to normal and could think of how to get revenge on FN-2187. She would still delude herself with that for a very long time, until the news came that, somehow, the Resistance had won.

Generally, when she came out of the med bay, the little more than a hundred people from the village indeed tried to talk to her and were nice to both her and Sarii. Not that she cared, but Sarii seemed to enjoy that. That's why, on the day the war ended, the locals called her on the med bay to watch the Resistance's victory being broadcasted live. Phasma was on the litter when she first heard the locals' agitation, and in a couple of minutes someone called Sarii outside. However, she only talked to them for a couple of minutes and then came back inside. She looked at Phasma for some seconds in silence, and then finally said: "_The Resistance has won, Captain._"

Sarii probably expected another kind of reaction, but Phasma just shrugged. "_It doesn't matter,_" Sarii kept quiet at that, and sit at a chair aside the litter. "_Why aren't you outside there celebrating with them? I know you want it._"

"_It doesn't make any difference at all, Captain, it's like you said,_" Sarii replied.

"_You're not very good at lying,_" Phasma said. Sarii looked down for some seconds.

"_It's a good village here, you know…_" she said. "_And they've been receptive to us all along… There might be some kind of future here–"_

"_Of course you gotta find your future here, Sarii, where else can you go?_" Phasma asked.

"_I'm not talking only about me, Captain._"

Phasma didn't bother looking at Sarii at first. "_Don't be ridiculous. It's not like it could work for me too,_" she said.

"_Why not?_"

"_What do you think is going to happen, Sarii? That I'm gonna suddenly discover that I always dreamed of being a farmer in a forgotten corner of the galaxy? That's not an option, and it never will be._"

Sarii looked down. "_I understand that, Captain, but… There's not really another option–"_

"_So now you know why I don't want to talk anymore about that,_" Phasma interrupted. Sarii was quiet. Phasma then sighed and said: "_You know, I was wrong. There're a lot of places you can go. You're healthy and free, no one knows who you are. You could get yourself a safe and fresh start now that the war is over._"

"_How would I possibly do that?_" Sarii asked.

"_You could start by going out there and celebrating the end of the war._"

"_Are you saying you want me to leave?_"

"_Yes, Sarii, I'm kindly asking you to leave me alone,_" Phasma hardly replied. Again, Sarii looked down. Phasma didn't say anything else. After some seconds, Sarii finally got up from the chair and left. It was better like that. Phasma preferred being alone.

However, that night, something different happened. After Phasma slept, images of the First Order came to her mind, the power, the glory, the countless battles she'd been to, and then, the fire. It burned, she could feel her skin boil and melt faster and faster, making her heart beat harder, and she couldn't breathe. The pain was taking over.

"_Captain!_"

Phasma opened her eyes suddenly, and the first thing she saw was that the lights of the med bay were on. She felt that she was sweating and trembling, and the pain she was feeling seconds ago seemed to still be there, fading away very slowly. Sarii was in front of her, and Hectre was aside.

"_You were screaming…_" Sarii continued. Realizing what was happening, Phasma finally breathed deep.

"_It was just a nightmare,_" she replied.

"_What did you dream of?_" Hectre asked.

Phasma just closed her eyes, wondering what difference that would make. "_Fire_," she said, still with her eyes closed. When she opened them, she saw Sarii looking confused at Hectre.

"_Is she off the meds?_" she asked.

"_No, the meds are normal,_" said Hectre, checking the intravenous medicines Phasma was taking, as she did every night. They were to prevent pain, so perhaps they thought she'd felt pain and it had caused the nightmare. Phasma had doubts about that. "_I'll give her something to sleep, and we'll talk about that tomorrow._"

Phasma didn't want to talk about that, but she didn't say anything at the moment. It would be pointless anyway because Hectre ministered the sleeping meds and she slowly fell into a dreamless sleep.

The next day, the elder doctor indeed came to the med bay when Phasma woke up. He and his female assistant put her seated on the moving chair and when the girl left, he asked Phasma about the nightmare.

"_It was just the fire, nothing else,_" she lied.

"_You don't have to worry about that, it's normal to have nightmares after being exposed to a traumatic situation,_" Hectre said.

"_I'm not traumatized._" Phasma rebuked.

"_Judging by the night terror you had yesterday, you are,_" Hectre calmly told her, and didn't give her time to talk back. "_Do you think it happened because the First Order lost the war?_"

"_Why does it have to have happened for a reason in the first place?_" Phasma asked, irritated.

"_Dreams generally have reasons to happen, Phasma_."

"_So you're a head doctor now?_"

Hectre laughed a little. "_No, but I've helped many of these people on going through difficult times since we came to this place, mainly to run from the wars of the galaxy,_" Phasma wasn't exactly convinced by that story. "_Most of them didn't want to live among such conflicts and had to deal with the loss of friends and family members. We all had to deal with trauma, but eventually, we restarted our lives._"

Phasma looked at the doctor. "_What do you mean by _restarted our lives_? Living from what the land gives you, finding someone to love and having children? Are you married, by chance?_"

"_I was, for a long time,_" Hectre replied. "_She died some years ago._"

"_No children?_" Phasma asked.

"_Not all men can give their wives a child, Phasma. And that's alright. The important thing is that humanity and affection help people going through trauma._"

"_Well, as I said, there's no trauma,_" Phasma reinforced.

Hectre then sighed. "_If you say so…_"

The doctor didn't insist on the conversation about the nightmare, and Sarii didn't dare to touch the subject later on. But it didn't exactly disappear, because Phasma had more nightmares. Not every night, but very often. She didn't get to wake up screaming again, but in her head, she screamed a lot. Those were symptoms she'd never had before, not even when Brendol Hux forced himself into her. She dreamed of him sometimes, but she was always able to control these dreams, so they didn't scare her. Those with the fire did. And although no one could see her dreams, she realized Sarii noticed what was happening, because she woke up in a certain night after one of these dreams and saw her watching her sleep. The trooper pretended not to be, but she was often in the med bay during nighttime, sleeping seated on that chair, or not really sleeping, for a reason Phasma couldn't understand. But it wasn't like she cared about what Sarii did.

Hectre's math was right about when she would go back on trying to walk; soon after the war ended, he started teaching her some exercises to prepare her legs for walking, and after some days, she finally put her feet on the ground again.

In the first seconds, it felt the weirdest thing in the universe. At that point, her burns were already healed and she could already sit comfortably and eat on her own using her arms and hands. Her bones were fixed. Still, her feet seemed to have forgotten what it was like to keep her standing. The exercises had strengthened her legs before she tried to walk, but they still felt weak, to the point of not baring her weight and almost making her fall down. Hectre and one of his assistants held her before she reached the ground. Sarii was watching everything, and seemed to be truly afflicted to see that.

"_It's alright, it's normal to fall in the first steps. Maybe it's too early and she's not yet ready,_" Hectre said, and that made Phasma deeply angry. It'd been past a year since Sarii had taken her to that planet, and she'd been treated like a cripple ever since then, but she was _not_ one. Hectre could know a lot about the healing process of everyone in that village, but he didn't know _her_.

Before they could say anything, she used all the strength she had and took another step, and this one kept her standing. And she didn't fall even in the next, and as both Hectre and his assistant stopped holding her, she walked five steps forward and then kept on standing and looking at everyone in the med bay, not for more than a couple of seconds, except for Sarii, because she saw a relieved smile on her face. "_I told you she'd recover,_" the trooper said.

Hectre nodded. "_You were right, Sarii. That was very good for the first time._"

"_I want to try some more_," Phasma said.

"_Wait for tomorrow, it's better for your legs,_" Hectre told her. "_But you did great._"

Phasma's legs were indeed trembling at that moment, because they were still too weak, but she kept on standing until the moving chair was brought for her to sit. That night, she finally slept a little bit more relieved.

In the next days, she made more muscular exercises and walked regularly in order to get used to the movements again, which happened naturally as time passed. Her back still hurt, but she insisted on walking even though. Eventually, it became a habit again, and that was when she finally left the med bay for good, and a small house with two bedrooms was given for her to share with Sarii.

Sarii was actually already living there, but she spent most of her time on the med bay and even slept there often. For Phasma, moving to the little house was at the same time comforting and anguishing, because she'd been on a med bay for more than a year and couldn't take it anymore, but as soon as she entered the new house, she realized that the med bay was the most technological place in the entire village. This reminded her of Parnassos, and as little as the resemblance was, she didn't like it.

Phasma still visited the med bay a lot, to practice her movements in a safer place. Sarii usually came along, although, since they'd moved out, she'd started doing more things along with the locals, which Phasma didn't. In fact, all she did outside the house was going to the med bay and to a forest that surrounded the village, to which she'd gone still in the moving chair, along with Sarii, some months ago. The place was silent and almost always empty, since the farmers only used it to walk some miles to another area of the planet, where they used to bury all the waste produced in the village that couldn't be recycled or used in the plantations. They'd found out that it was the best way not to damage the planet, so they took the trails on a one-day trip to do it from time to time. Sarii had gone with them once, and only returned at night, meeting Phasma on the house, already preparing to sleep. "_This planet's beautiful. The forest, the beaches… It's an untouched piece of the galaxy,_" Sarii talked a lot, but Phasma didn't always reply, so their conversations were pretty much monologues. "_Do you want to go watch the HoloNet?_"

"_No_," Phasma replied.

Sarii walked to her. "_You spent the whole day inside here, I imagine."_

"_Yes._"

"_So why not coming out? Now that you're back on walking, there's nothing holding you inside, you can live your life, do your things… Right?_"

Phasma didn't look at Sarii while she talked. 'Living your life' was an annoying and generical sentence that said nothing in the end. "_Right. I'll do something new tomorrow._"

"_What?_" Sarii asked.

Phasma looked at her, then. "_Fighting._"

When the morning came, Phasma went to the forest before most of the village woke up, got herself a big twig that was on the floor and, after finding an area with enough room to practice, she concentrated and made a simple fighting move she remembered.

The pain that stroke into her spine was hellish.

"_You shouldn't do this, Captain, it might harm all your treatment…_"

Of course Sarii had followed her. It was what she did the most since they'd come to that planet. "_I'm walking normally now. Fighting is a natural consequence._"

"_But we're not on the First Order, there's no need of fighting here…_" Sarii insisted again, while Phasma made another move, and, once more, it caused her a killing pain. She stopped for a moment to breathe.

"_We never know when we'll need to fight,_" it was all Phasma said, and went back to her practice ignoring that Sarii was there.

On the first days, Phasma could barely stand ten minutes of fighting, and that made her angry and frustrated. But there was something powerful about her anger, that made her stronger ever since she was a child. Moved by the feeling, she ignored both Sarii and Hectre, later on, telling her to stop, and ignored even her pain, that got better but never went away. Even when the months passed and the fighting moves became natural again, her body, mainly her spine, still ached. But Phasma didn't stop.

She practiced early in the morning and by the end of the afternoon, when the villagers were returning from their plantations. Sarii stopped going with her eventually, and the rest of the village didn't ask about it. Phasma liked it better this way; she could fight in peace, finally. Even because no one had anything to do with that, and mainly, with her future plans.

Phasma hadn't given up on making FN-2187 pay. She still didn't know how, but she'd get her revenge.

That afternoon was colder than most, but she'd been training for more than two hours now, so she was sweating a lot and didn't mind the cold. By now, her fighting was so much better, but she didn't feel it was the same as before, that's why she kept on practicing. She'd built a baton with old metal pieces the farmers had, and she'd been using it to practice for some time now. It was heavier than the one she used on the First Order, but by now she was already used with that. The sun was almost going down, but she kept on making moves and simulating a fight, dealing with her pain until her spine didn't let her continue. Phasma then stopped, gasping a little, and realizing she'd practiced more that day than she used to do, which made her tired and sore.

That still wasn't enough. She'd need to practice for more time before leaving Lah'mu to fulfill her plans.

Holding the baton she'd left on the ground for a moment to rest, Phasma finally left the forest to go back to the village. Sweat was dripping down her face and hair, which reached half of her back now, and she didn't like to tie it back, so she just left it as it was. The clothes she wore had been given by the locals, and were very simple, nothing but a shirt, pants and a pair of boots. She left the forest in a couple of minutes and walked down the entrance of the village. Her body was still aching, so she decided to go to the med bay to ask Hectre for a painkiller injection.

Some farmers were also returning from their plantations, but no one said more than a couple of words to her. It was usually like that now, and Phasma preferred it. She went straight to the med bay and found Hectre as soon as she entered, finishing giving one of the villagers some meds. He noticed she was there as soon as the man left. "How was your day, Phasma?"

"Good," Phasma replied. "I need painkillers."

"And why is that?" Hectre asked.

"I was fighting and it hurt more than it usually does."

"You can't fill yourself up with painkillers and pretend it's gonna be alright with your body. You'll get addicted and the pain's gonna get worse."

"I have no choice, I need it to keep on practicing my fighting," Phasma said, emotionless.

"I've told you more than once:" Hectre repeated. "You shouldn't be practicing fighting."

"What I do is not up to you," Phasma rebuked.

Hectre got a painkiller injection and applied it on her arm, finally. "No, it's not up to me, but it doesn't change a fact that you need to accept, Phasma: your glorious warrior days are over."

Phasma looked at the elder doctor firmly, with her only working eye, which had caused her hard times with her fighting in the beginning, but now she had gotten used to it. Hectre just removed the injection from her arm and stared at her with an irritating calm gaze.

Just he waited. "We'll see about that," Phasma didn't wait for Hectre to say anything and it just left the med bay to go to her house.

Sarii wasn't there, so Phasma decided to take a shower. Their bedrooms were separate, but they shared the bathroom. Phasma didn't really care about it, though, because she didn't like to spend much time in the bathroom, at least not anymore. Bathrooms had mirrors, and she wasn't comfortable with looking at her reflection at the moment, even if she would never admit it to anyone. That's why the mirrors hadn't been removed from the house. Now she avoided looking at them, but she still remembered the first time she'd seen her reflection after she'd fallen into the fire: the burns were already healed, but they'd made parts of her skin thick and rough, mainly on her face, where it had even gotten reddish around her now blank and injured eye that had gotten blind.

After the shower, Phasma ate some vegetables that were in the kitchen and left to the village's main garden, where the farmers were at their weekly meeting while watching the HoloNet. Sarii hadn't returned to the house, so she was probably there.

Indeed, she was, seated at a table braiding her brown hair, that had grown as well, and she also hadn't cut it. She saw Phasma right away, and Phasma seated at her side to watch the HoloNet, as she wasn't interested in what the villagers were discussing with Hectre, who was also there. The HoloNet was broadcasting a show host by a reporter called Alma Snaifred, who weekly told supposedly-untold stories from the war between the Resistance and the First Order. Not that Phasma cared, as always, but everyone seemed interested in that skinny blonde young woman digging controversial stories from that time of the galaxy. According to what Phasma had come to know, Snaifred was very famous.

"What is she talking about today?" Phasma asked Sarii.

"About the people from Jakku during the war," she said.

"Did she really go to Jakku to tell these stories?" Phasma said, not really believing that, although the images in the holocaster were from Alma Snaifred in Jakku's dunes. "That's impressive."

Both of them kept on watching the show until it was almost over, when the discussion between the villagers became more interesting.

"Someone has to go bury the trash tomorrow. There's less than usual, so it's not necessary that many of you go, though," Hectre announced.

"I could go, but I gotta work a lot on my plantation tomorrow," a man said, and a woman aside him nodded her agreement. In some seconds, many villagers started saying that they couldn't go either, whether because of their work in the farms or because of children, ill relatives and many other reasons. While they talked, Phasma thought a little.

"I can go," she said. The villagers looked at her, mainly Hectre and Sarii, who was still seated at her side.

"It's not much trash but there's still some, and it's bad for your spine to carry weight," said Hectre.

"I won't carry weight, Sarii will," Phasma replied, turning her head aside then and looking at Sarii. Not surprisingly, she nodded right away. Phasma turned to Hectre again. "Also, she knows the way, so we'll never get lost."

"Sarii?" Hectre asked.

Sarii just nodded once more. "It's alright, I can carry the trash myself and dig the hole to bury it. Since it's not much, we might be back before sunset."

Seeing that they agreed and that no one seemed to oppose to that, Hectre just shrugged. "Alright. If that's the case, you can leave tomorrow morning."

Phasma nodded, and while the villagers started talking among themselves again, she turned to Sarii and announced: "I'm going to sleep."

"Why did you offer to go bury the waste, Captain?" Sarii asked.

"My back is aching too much, I can't practice tomorrow," Phasma replied. "At least I'll have something to do." she didn't wait for Sarii's response, and just left to the house they shared, where she went to her room and laid in the humble bed it had to sleep. But before she closed her eyes, she looked at the corner of the room, where she'd left, like they were abandoned, the pieces of her chromed armor. The metallic pieces that had saved her from turning into ashes.

And, bedside, in the small nightstand, her helmet, still broken where FN-2187 had hit it, seemed reflective and shiny even in the dark. Before sleeping, Phasma always stared at it. Somehow, she felt like it was watching over her, a silly feeling she'd strangely gotten attached to.

Unfortunately, her old helmet looking to her wasn't enough to protect her from the nightmares with the fire.

* * *

ON KESSEL

Kessel's atmosphere was filled with ships coming and going from it everywhere, but one of them was stationed, and it'd been for a while now. Big as it was, the ship had room for smaller and simpler ships on its lower floor, which had an exit for those too, through where a slender girl with medium-dark skin and long brown hair was getting ready to fly. While setting up her own ship, she listened to her boss, a tall man with a black beard, instructing: "They're probably getting there in a couple of minutes, according to what you said. Stay in their meeting the less you can, just enough to get the information we need, and then run out before they notice and come back."

She checked the ship's energy and made sure it was enough. "Understood."

Aside her boss, a Dug and another man were watching her departure. "Are you sure they trust you enough to let you know this information?" the Dug asked.

"I've given them clues for many trophies they got in the last year, so yes, they trust me," the girl replied.

"The many trophies we abdicated from in order for them to gain your trust and never discover you work for me," said the boss.

"But all those trophies combined are not worth half the cash we gonna make with this one, Darios," the girl reminded him.

He gave a satisfied smile. "Of course. That's why I agreed with this plan," while she retributed his smile, she got her metal baton from the floor to put it inside her ship. "Why are you taking this?"

She shrugged. "One can never be too careful," as she finished talking, she put on her hard black helmet to hide her face. "I'll be back shortly."

"I'm sure you will," Darios said, and the girl entered the ship, then waited for the big ship's exit to open and flew away.

"Do you really trust her enough to bring us this information?" the man aside the dug asked. He wasn't that tall, but was bigger when it came to muscles.

"Of course I don't," Darios replied. "That's why you gonna follow her. Get your ship and make sure to spy on them without being seen. Get the information we need and watch her. If she doesn't leave as soon as she hears it from them, you come back before her and we leave to get the trophy before them. And I'll deal with her later," at the same moment, the man nodded and entered a ship aside, also departing in a few seconds.

The girl was ready to land by then. Wearing black and brown clothes and a pair of old boots, she mingled easily among the people who walked quickly in the streets of that not-so-bright area of Kessel, where every kind of smuggler and forbidden substances dealer found room to do their negotiations. It was also where trophy hunters groups met sometimes. When she left her ship, she got her baton and also a blaster she always carried with her.

Indeed, one could never be too careful.

She knew where to go, and it was only a few blocks away, so she hurried to get to the small and somewhat hidden low-rank cantina; a great place for trophy hunters to disguise and meet with whoever they wanted. This time, the group was in a separate room, all its ten members standing in front of a table where a man was seated, drinking from a bottle.

"What took you so long?" a dark-skinned bald man asked her, the one who was closer to the one who was seated.

"I had to find a safe place for my ship. It's far, so I had to walk to here," the girl replied, taking off her helmet.

"Any luck with what I sent you to catch on Cantonica?" the man asked again.

"Unfortunately not. The trophy was already gone when I arrived, so I thought better returning, since this trophy is more important."

The bald man just snorted. "We'll deal with that later," he turned to te seated man, who was still drinking. "Well, Temon, I hope you've brought us here for a reason."

Temon cleared his throat. "I wouldn't waste your time, Arman, you know that. It was hard to track since all the First Order cruisers were lost after the end of the war, as you well know, but luckily some of their data remained untouched."

"So you found it?" Arman asked. Temon smiled ironically.

"Yes, my friend. I know where your trophy is," he cleared his throat again. "But I had to contact every kind of person and alien in this underworld to hack this data, I'm owing a lot of people now… I need more cash."

"What? This wasn't part of our deal!" Arman protested.

"Again, I won't waste your time. If you don't pay me, be sure Darios's crew will," Temon calmly said, and the girl was frightened to hear Darios's name, to the point of, when she saw Arman didn't seem likely to give away, she said:

"Pay him, Arman. Whatever we spend with him, will not come close to what the New Galactic Order will pay to us when we deliver them the trophy…"

Arman didn't like that at all, but he must have done the math and realized she was right, because he ordered one of the members to put a bag with credits upon Temon's table in the act. "Now tell me the location, Temon."

Temon counted the credits and, finally, said: "Lah'mu."

Arman was shocked. "Lah'mu? That's impossible, don't you play with me–"

"That's the location, my friend." Temon interrupted. "We tracked down all the supremacy's data, and precisely on that tragic day, a TIE Fighter flew from there to Lah'mu. Whoever flew it probably didn't think it was still sending coordinates to their central, and, among that chaos, it seems like the First Order didn't care about such coordinates. I bet all these credits that if you fly to Lah'mu, you'll find the First Order jewel only pretending to be dead."

All the members of that crew were now paying full attention to what Temon was saying, probably drunk with the thought of the payment they'd share after that specific trophy was delivered to the New Galactic Order. It'd be a lot of cash, the girl knew that, but she didn't let herself be fooled by it. While the others were distracted, agile as she'd learned to be, she left the room in absolute silence, reached the cantina's door and ran to her ship the fastest she could. When she reached it, she immediately programmed its route: straight to Lah'mu.

She was about to close the ship's door when she saw, right in front of it but still outside, the figure of a man watching her carefully, and she recognized instantly the man who was with Darios and the dug when she'd left their ship. He'd seen her, and he'd probably also seen the location she was programming her ship to fly to. It was too late now.

At the same moment, the man started to run, and she got to pick up her blaster and shoot in his direction, but he was faster; he entered another ship stationed some yards away and left the ground before her shots could cause damage. The girl just watched it leave, her heart pounding in her chest. Her plans had gone wrong, but there was still something she could do.

Even if her ship was smaller and much less potent, she could still jump to hyperspace and go to Lah'mu. Both Arman and Darios now knew the information she wanted to use with privilege, so she would fight them both if she had to. And all their men. But she'd catch that trophy.

She would be the one to catch Captain Phasma.

* * *

So, yeah, Phasma is not as safe as she thinks. Do you have any guess on what will happen in chapter 3? Tell me what you think! If you enjoyed this chapter, please, leave a comment! It makes my day!

Thanks for reading and may the Force be with you all!


	3. Catch Her First

Hey, everyone! I can't believe I'm finally uptading this story! I'm so happy!

First of all, I'm so sorry for keeping you waiting forever... I've been through hard times since the last time I updated. It's safe to say that so many bad things happened to me that I couldn't even think of writing. However, I recently got to finish not only this third chapter, but a full planning of this story, so the good news is: every single arch, character and plot twist of Ignited Survivor is fully planned. Now I just gotta sit down and write it all (btw, big thanks to the amazing PierceTheVeils for helping me on planning the story)! At least my COVID-19 quarantine will be useful for that... Btw, how's quaratine going in your countries? Tell me everything!

I hope you enjoy this chapter despite how long I took to post it, and the fact that, again, it's a long chapter. Don't forget to tell me what you think later on!

Have a good reading!

* * *

**CHAPTER THREE**

– **CATCH HER FIRST –**

ON LAH'MU

As soon as the sun came up in Lah'mu, Phasma and Sarii left the small house to go take the trails on the forest. They ate at the main garden watching the HoloNet, and Sarii picked up the bags of trash where the villagers used to storage it. When they're about to leave, the others were walking to their plantations, and Hectre came outside with them. "Weather is great today. You two won't have problems on the trails, I imagine."

"That's most likely," Sarii agreed, accommodating the bags on her back.

"Take blasters with you anyway," Hectre said. Sarii just nodded and went to get the blasters where they were kept. Phasma was quiet, with her metal baton attached to a belt she was wearing that day. The villagers said there were animals on the forest, and although they didn't cause trouble often, you never knew when it could be the next time.

"Ready. Let's go," Sarii returned with two blasters and headed one to Phasma, who said nothing again, and they both just walked towards the forest, where they found the trail and started following it.

"How long until we get there?" Phasma asked.

"The whole morning. Then we'll dig a big hole to put the waste and return in the afternoon. We'll be back before sunset," Sarii replied. She was also carrying a shovel to do the burying, but she seemed to be okay with the weight, so Phasma didn't say anything.

They barely talked all the way, mainly because Phasma wasn't in the mood for conversations; she preferred to keep herself distracted with the trees and birds from the forest. The terrain wasn't the easiest to walk in, but she was used to much harder ground. They weren't on a hurry, so they could go slowly in the difficult parts. There was no schedule, then the only thing they had to worry about was coming back while there was still sunlight.

Although it was completely different, walking down the forest reminded Phasma of when she was still on Parnassos, seeking for Brendol Hux's ship. Which made her think of when she'd been to Luprora two years ago, when she'd called Pilot – or better, TN-3465 – by Siv's name.

The only problem of not talking to anyone was that her mind kept on speeding with thoughts. Her mind was usually fast, so it just made it worse. Honestly, the only moments she could remember of not thinking were when she blanked out completely, and it only had happened a few times since she'd gotten to the First Order. The one she remembered the most except from the fall into the fire was a battle in which a blaster shot had hit her helmet, and although it ricocheted, the hit was strong and she ended up fainting. But nothing really happened because of that; she woke up on the med bay the next day, and the droids had already scanned her and there was no damage at all. Two days later, she was back to battle.

Phasma never knew where the shots had come from, or how she'd let herself be shot like that. On a normal day, it would never happen. But her great memory remembered she'd been feeling a little bit dizzy and sick on that specific day, and on the previous ones too. It'd been a couple of weeks before Brendol Hux had been declared dead, which had happened about a month after he'd put her through the worst pain she'd ever felt when he forced himself into her for what would be the last time.

Phasma didn't believe in forgetting bad things to get rid of the feelings they brought, but that specific memory, she'd rather not keeping so clear. "How far have we gone?" she asked.

"Past half the way," Sarii replied. "We'll be there soon."

She was walking in front of Phasma, because she knew the way. The bags she was carrying seemed heavy after all that time walking, but she was handling it well. She still said a couple of things about how she enjoyed the forest and the trees, but Phasma barely replied.

Finally, after about two hours from that point, they got to a big valley, with a beach on their left and a mountain not far, which had, on its top, a white building. Its walls were kind of dirty, with sand, probably, but still, their light color was much different from the rest of the landscape. The roof upon them was black, and there were some windows spread around that strange kind of house.

"It's here," Sarii said, looking at Phasma over her shoulder. It was a little bit past half of the day, so the sun was shining high among the clouds in the sky, which were just a few, so it was very bright and warm around.

"What's that?" Phasma asked, pointing at the house on the hill.

"A house," Sarii replied. "According to what the villagers told me the last time we came here, it hasn't been occupied for many years now, because it's far from the village. They preferred to stick together, I think… It's a shame. The house's beautiful, and it must have a perfect view of the beach's sunset."

Phasma looked at the house again. Indeed, it seemed a bad idea to live alone in the middle of nowhere like that. The people in that village seemed to have some brains, in the end. Or perhaps it'd been Hectre's idea to keep everyone together. Well, he had brains. More than she'd like, in fact.

Before the mountain, there was a valley, which was half covered by the black sand of the beach, half covered by a soft green lawn. Sarii walked some miles down it until she reached the sand. The sea was still a little bit forward, but you could hear the waves loud and see them moving from where Phasma was standing, watching Sarii leaving her bags on the floor and holding the shovel. "Is that where you dig?"

"Yes," Sarii said. "The hole must be big, so they told me it's better to dig close to the sand cause it's easier–"

"Okay, give me the shovel," Phasma interrupted.

Sarii's eyes turned to her right away. "Captain, you can't do this kind of effort, your spine–"

"It'll be just fine, don't you worry," Phasma said, not waiting for Sarii to give her the shovel and getting it herself. She could spare herself from the hard work, but she just couldn't stand the boredom of doing nothing the whole time. So she started digging the hole and ignored Sarii saying she shouldn't do that.

In the first moment, she managed to dig, but when she was in the middle of the hole, her spine indeed ached. She ignored that too. Somehow, she didn't want to make it seem like she was disabled, not even just for Sarii. So Phasma kept on digging and digging until the pain got unbearable. She stopped for a second to put her hand on her back, taking a deep breath to continue, but before she could, she turned back and saw Sarii staring at her, with the same anguished eyes she always did when Phasma felt any kind of pain.

Phasma would rather not having seen that. She felt a strange kind of anger when people looked at her like that, everyone, but with Sarii it was worse. Ever since they'd gotten to Lah'mu. Why the hell did she care so much? Phasma still wondered, and it annoyed her to death. But no matter how she felt about that, Sarii still did it, and no one in the universe seemed to be able to make her stop.

Sarii said nothing to Phasma, but her gaze was enough to make Phasma angry to the point of giving up what she was doing. She then just threw the shovel to Sarii and, also saying nothing, went away from the whole and sit on the floor.

In some seconds, Sarii started digging, and Phasma didn't look even look at her. She was seated with her back to the hole, watching the sky eventually turn orange in the horizon upon the empty house on the hill. Sunset was not far, they had to go soon. Luckily, Sarii seemed to be almost done burying the waste. Phasma again ignored this because she didn't like to think she hadn't been able to dig a hole. How would she go back on fighting, to seek her revenge or whatever, if she felt that much pain by digging a hole? No matter how much she was training, it wasn't enough. But could she do more? Or was Hectre right, and her days of glorious warrior were indeed over?

"I'm done, Captain," Sarii announced.

Phasma tried to forget her thoughts and turned to her. "Good. Let's go."

Both of them got their stuff from the floor – Phasma had left the baton and the blaster there when she'd attempted to dig, and Sarii had buried the bags too, since they were disposable, and was carrying only one now, where Phasma imagined that the shovel was kept – and went back to the forest. This time, Phasma walked in front of Sarii, since she already knew the way. They kept on walking silently for some time, only hearing the birds and she sound of the trees swaying smoothly.

"How bad is your back?" Sarii asked.

Phasma tried to ignore her annoyance with the fact that the trooper had interrupted her peaceful silence. "It's fine," she roughly replied.

"Are you sure?" Sarii, of course, insisted. "Perhaps some analgesic shocks would help with the pain, I brought the applier, Hectre allowed me to after I asked."

Phasma almost stopped walking. The analgesic shocks were a technique to prevent chronical pain, according to Hectre. It was nothing but a small machine that vibrated in contact with the injured part of your body and the electric vibration helped it heal, he said. He'd used that on Phasma's bones sometimes, but she would never expect Sarii to bring the applier to a one-day trip just in case Phasma felt pain. "Did you actually bring it?" she inquired.

"Of course I did, and I was not wrong to, your spine–"

"My spine is _fine_, didn't you hear what I just said?" Phasma asked again, without looking at Sarii. She thought the trooper would be quiet at that, but she didn't:

"You know, you don't have to hide that you're in pain…" Sarii said. "It's okay, everybody has pain–"

"Goddamit, Sarii, why the hell do you care?" Phasma inquired, looking back a little this time. Sarii seemed a little shocked with the tone of the question.

"Why does it bother you so much that I care?" she inquired back. Phasma then finally stopped walking and turned to her, and she was going to rebuke if she didn't hear a loud noise coming from the sky.

Phasma looked up, and she could notice Sarii was doing the same, and both spotted, flying right upon them, small and fast ships, about four or five, preparing to land in the forest, not far from where they were.

The two of them kept on staring at where the ships were going, their noise still echoing down the silent forest, making the birds fly away all around. Phasma paid attention to the ships: they looked dirty, old somehow, anything like the ships from the First Order.

"It's not the New Galactic Order, the ships would carry its blazon if it was…" Sarii said.

"I know," said Phasma. She was still looking for the ships, but they had landed already, so she couldn't see them anymore.

"But who else would come to this planet? And land in the middle of the forest?" Sarii asked. Phasma thought a bit. Indeed, the New Galactic Order wouldn't come without official ships, and the last ship that'd landed close to that village was the TIE Fighter Sarii had stolen from the First Order.

"It doesn't matter," Phasma replied. "Whoever it is, it's safer for us if we're not seen. Let's not take unnecessary risks. We should get away from the trails, they're the first thing to be found in this forest," Sarii agreed right away. "Can you find the way back to the village without following the trails?"

"I can try," Sarii said.

"Take the front, then," Phasma ordered. Sarii obeyed right away, and they walked out of the trail to get into the forest. They'd have to be fast if they wanted to get to the village in time, because the sunset wouldn't take long to come, and walking in the dark almost alone didn't seem any prudent, mainly with strangers coming from who knows where in that same forest.

While walking, Phasma paid all the attention she could to the noises around. It was something she used to do a lot on Parnassos, and it was useful on battles and missions on the First Order too, so it'd become a habit of hers. You could never be too precautious when danger could be around. Well, for now, everything seemed quiet on the forest, and the village must be close by now. Sarii was walking fast. She was fast, according to what Phasma remembered from the First Order, it was one of her best qualities. "Are we close?" Phasma asked.

"Yes, captain," Sarii replied. "Just a few more miles, I think, although it's hard to tell away from the trail–"

"Wait," Phasma suddenly stopped walking because she heard something not far. Sarii seemed to notice that too after some seconds, and starred somewhat worried at Phasma. "Tell me these are villagers coming inside the forest…"

Sarii couldn't reply, because the noise once far came close enough to be recognized as steps, and before any of them could move, some figures became visible among the trees, about a mile away.

Phasma kept standing where she was. The first figure she saw was a man, but after that some more appeared, and aliens too. All of them carrying weapons. She held her blaster tight, and when Sarii looked at her again, she whispered. "Don't run, they'll follow us if we do–"

"I'll deceive them, then," Sarii replied "Let me handle this."

Phasma didn't have time to say anything, because the group of men and aliens found them right away. They were eight, five humans and three aliens. Two of them she didn't know the species, but one was a Dug. She hadn't seen any Dug since Parnassos, but she would recognize them anywhere.

Disgusting creatures.

"Good evening," Sarii said to the group. "I'm Sarii, who are you?"

"Evening," replied the man in front of the group. He wasn't very tall, but had big muscles to compensate. "What are two women doing alone on a forest when it's about to get dark?"

Sarii replied in less than a second. "We're hunting. We live on a village close to here, sometimes we come to the forest to find food–"

"You hear that?" one of the aliens asked the man in front. "What we saw was a village, we should go there, it'll be easier to find what we're looking for…" whatever they were talking about, the alien didn't get much attention, because the man in front was looking at something else: Phasma. And that was enough to get her alarmed.

They'd come from who knows where just now, and they said they were looking for something. But what if something was actually _someone_?

"How can you hunt with a blind eye?" the man asked Phasma. She thought of something quickly.

"I have it since I'm very young, so I'm used to that by now," she invented. In the second of silence that came after, she took a careful look at the group one more time: the other men weren't as muscular as the one leading, but you could see they were strong. And both them and the aliens were armed. In fact, the muscular man was holding his blaster very tight at that moment.

"Same for the burns?" he asked.

Phasma kept her working eye on him. "Yes. An accident that happened in my childhood."

The group starred at her and Sarii, and they starred back at them. Something was not right there, Phasma knew that. "Well, as you said yourself, it's getting late–" Sarii started to say.

"Your voice sounds somewhat familiar," the leading man interrupted, talking to Phasma, not Sarii. He was too suspicious, and so were all the others.

"I'm sure it's a coincidence," Phasma replied to him.

"And we really need to go now, before it gets too dark–" Sarii tried to say again, but the man was quick to cut her sentence this time, and not just with words, but wielding his blaster and pointing it to her, along with the others in the group. Sarii stopped right away.

"It's just a second, I promise you," said the man. "You two, together, tell me her name," he was looking at Phasma again, and she then was sure: Sarii hadn't been able to deceive them, and they were suspicious about who she really was. How it was possible didn't matter, not now. She had to do something.

Slowly, the most she could, Phasma started to get her blaster ready, in a way no one would notice, because she'd learned how to act in situations like that.

"So? Nothing?" the man asked. Sarii was paralyzed, but Phasma had seen that coming. She just had to trust her instincts now and find the right moment to attack. And it came in a single second, when the man turned his face back a little. "Well, I think we just bumped into our–"

He couldn't finish his sentence; at that same moment, Phasma wielded her blaster pointed to him and took a shot that hit him in his chest, and he fell dead in the ground in the act.

In less than a second, Phasma threw herself to the ground not to be hit by a shot one of the aliens took, Sarii almost shot him in the arm and all of the group started running to them, making Sarii come to Phasma, pull her up and scream. "Run!"

The first thing Phasma felt was her spine aching from hitting the ground so hardly, but she couldn't even pay attention to that, because she rushed with Sarii for behind some trees that were in a higher part of the forest, forming a kind of protection if you stood behind them, something both of them saw in their desperate run. They took some more shots, but those seemed like nothing close to the group's. They were in much bigger number.

"Don't shoot to kill, we need her alive!" one of the men shouted. Sarii almost hit him instants later, but three shots came in her direction after she did that, forcing her to hide again.

"Captain, what do we do?" she asked. Phasma couldn't take a breath to think, for she had to deviate from more shots. That group, whoever they were, was chasing her, not Sarii. "Captain?!"

Phasma took another shot, and brought down one of the aliens this time. "Aim for their blasters and hands, if they can't shoot they'll try physical combat, and then we may have a chance," she ordered, and Sarii immediately turned over and fired her blaster at a stone, causing an explosion that prevented the group from moving further.

That gave her and Phasma a second to aim for their weapons, and they got to disarm two of them, whether by breaking their blasters or shooting their hands, and one of them seemed to have been hit by a fragment of the stone Sarii had blasted. Three were compromised and couldn't shoot at least for now. Just three more to go.

Whoever those were, they hardly would have more combat training than soldiers from the First Order.

"Shoot the remaining three," Phasma said, holding her baton tight and leaving her protected corner to run towards the two men and one alien who seemed disabled and hit the first she could. She knew that blasters would kill them more easily, but she'd always been faster with the baton, and shooting them after they were on the ground would be easier than hitting a moving target. That's what she did to the man who was closer and he fell just like she predicted. Phasma then attempted to disable or kill the other man and the alien, while Sarii kept on trying to disable or kill the Dug and the remaining man, but she seemed to be failing at that, because right after Phasma got to kill the man she'd just brought down, she saw Sarii's blaster falling from her hand after a shot destroyed it, and in the instant their eyes met, Phasma heard her scream. "Captain, watch out!"

Distracted with the shot that'd taken Sarii's blaster, Phasma couldn't see when the alien tried to strike her from behind, and as she deviated, he got her baton and pushed her down.

The fall made her feel instantly kind of sore, probably remains of having many bones broken not so long ago, and it got worse when Phasma tried to get up the fastest she could to attack those two back, but her blaster had fallen too far away for her to catch it in time.

Sarii, unarmed, tried to run to her, but the man she was fighting with held her before she could. Phasma tried to get up again and failed, and her heart raced hardly when she saw those two foreign enemies pointing their blasters to her. She had no blaster to fight back, no baton to strike them with, and there was no way to run. However, when she thought to be seeing them approach to hold her down, a quick noise echoed behind them, and before Phasma could see what it was, something hit the head of the man in front of her, and a hole wrecked it apart, throwing blood drops everywhere, and the man with his brain mangled fell on Phasma's feet, allowing her to see, behind where he was standing, a slim figure wearing brown clothes, boots and a black helmet, holding a just-fired blaster.

Sarii was again paralyzed with shock, and the three remaining members of the group were too, but when Phasma saw the figure preparing to take another shot, she got up from the ground in a speed not even her would believe if she saw, punched the alien close to her in the face and stole his blaster, shooting him right after.

The second shot of the figure in brown made the last man let go of Sarii, and she immediately started to fight him, while that mysterious figure hunted down the Dug. Phasma got her baton back and attempted to strike the man Sarii was fighting, failing at first, but putting him down in the second time, and Sarii was fast to get his blaster and kill him with it.

Phasma didn't look at Sarii, because the next thing she saw was the Dug running like a bullet, almost being hit by a shot but escaping narrowly, and disappearing among the forest before anyone could run after him, including the just-arrived figure, who was still wielding her blaster, making Sarii wield hers too. "Get away!" she screamed.

"You really think I would come and shoot them just to kill you myself?" a female voice came from behind the black helmet, and the figure took it off seconds later, revealing a face with delicate features, but the light brown eyes on it had a strong gaze.

Phasma starred at the girl. She was tall and slender, and her hair somewhat wavy reached half of her back, with a medium-brown color, different from her skin, that had a bright tone of brown, much like the eyes. Which, at the moment, were fixed on Phasma. "Who are you, then?" Phasma asked.

"My name's Kavya," replied the girl. She was still holding her blaster, but it was down, though. "And no, I'm not here to kidnap you."

"What about whose people, who were they?" Sarii asked.

"Trophy-hunters," Kavya said, walking around like she was taking a look at the surroundings. "Criminals and gangsters from planets from the Outer Rim and the Unknown Regions who chase outlaws from the war to deliver them to the New Galactic Order."

Sarii seemed shocked. "Why would the New Galactic Order do that? What do people think about–"

"People don't know," Kavya interrupted. "The New Galactic Order finds it better for building their future to capture the outlaws and bring them to the Interplanetary Court to be judged for war crimes than to use moral ways to bring people a feeling of justice. And it's effective, since they keep people satisfied and the gangs of planets they don't yet rule over under control at the same time. Doing all of that under the table seems a fair price for them," she explained, stopping in front of Phasma to then continue. "The targets are called trophies, and the more important this target was for the First Order while it still existed, the bigger will be the payment the New Galactic Order will give the hunters for capturing it. There're many crews out there, but the two main ones have been focusing on hunting one same trophy for the whole last year: you, Phasma."

Phasma starred back at Kavya. "How's that even possible? The whole galaxy thinks I'm dead…"

Kavya's eyes were still serious, but she let a little bit of irony show. "Don't act like you don't know your own fame," she said. Phasma didn't exactly have a quick response for that.

"But how do you know all of that if you're not with them?" Sarii asked.

"I've been with them since they started hunting, short after the war ended," Kavya clarified. "Originally with the crew landed by a hunter called Darios. The group that attacked you was part of his crew. But I convinced him to let me work as a double agent in the other big crew around, because they were looking for Phasma too, and I thought they could get the information of where she was faster than Darios. Which they did."

Phasma intended to ask Kavya what she was doing there after all, but she didn't have the time for it, because Sarii quickly inquired. "Wait, so it means this other crew is coming here too?"

"They're here already, I saw them landing on the village close to this forest," Kavya replied. Before anyone could do anything, Sarii turned her head suddenly to the side, more specifically the side where the village was. Phasma quickly realized what she was thinking.

"We gotta warn the others!" Sarii said, starting to run towards the village soon after, and Phasma, for being sore from the fight and the falls, took a second before trying to stop her from the big mistake she was making.

"Sarii, no!" she shouted when she finally managed to run too, and she saw that Kavya was coming along, but, as she knew well, Sarii was indeed fast, so none of them got to catch her for the miles they went through until reaching the border between the forest and the village, which wasn't far at all. But when they got there, what they saw was the villagers grouped close to the main garden, and Hectre in front of them, talking to a man dressed in black, who had come with a bigger group than the one in the forest.

"…let's keep calm, everyone," Hectre was saying exactly when Sarii stopped right in the ending of the forest, where Phasma used to practice her fighting. No one would be able to see them there, but they could hear what they said. "I'm sure we can solve whatever the problem is with dialogue–"

"There's no problem to be solved," the man in front interrupted. "We know the one formerly known as Captain Phasma is hiding in this planet. Tell us where she is and no harm will come to your people."

Phasma was standing behind Sarii, with Kavya by her side, and she couldn't help but feeling a chill down her spine when she heard that.

"Trust me, I'd surely know if a servant of the First Order had come to this village," Hectre replied, and Phasma felt even more shocked with that. She certainly didn't believe Hectre would put the whole village in danger in order to protect her.

"I'm not going to ask again…" the man in black murmured roughly, wielding a blaster he had in his hands.

"Don't do that, son, harming these people won't give you what you want…" Hectre tried to say, but the man didn't seem to want to hear him, because the rest of the group wielded blasters too, making Sarii quiver.

"Sarii, you can't help them…" Phasma slowly said, just for Sarii to hear, but she didn't turn back, so Phasma held her arm roughly, forcing her to face her. "Be rational. They're already in the village, there's nothing you can do to help."

"I can't leave them at these guys' mercy after all they did to us!" Sarii protested, but before Phasma could talk, they heard one of the men from the village interrupt Hectre's dialogue with the group of trophy hunters:

"I'm done with this. They want her, not us," he said to Hectre, and then turned to the man in black. "She lives in that house over there, if you go inside it you'll see the pieces of the armor she used to wear. She went to the forest this morning, you'll find her if you look over there."

Sarii stared at the village after that, and Phasma couldn't say anything because Kavya was faster. "They're gonna come here and they'll take the three of us, not just Phasma," Phasma didn't interrupt her, for she knew what she was saying was probably true. "I hid my ship in a good place, they probably won't find us if we rush to here now. It's your only chance to go off planet without putting anyone in danger, including yourselves."

Phasma was still holding Sarii, and she looked at her this time, but didn't say anything. Kavya was starting to walk, and both Sarii and Phasma followed her the fastest they could instead of talking to each other. Sarii probably realized they had a short time to possibly save themselves. Phasma didn't have doubts about that, but her mind was filled with thoughts on something else.

Why was Kavya helping her? She said she'd been deceiving both trophy-hunters' crews, but what was that for? Phasma knew she couldn't trust. She was only following that girl now because she, rational as she was, knew that it was her only possibility of escaping that planet. It could be a trap, yes, but she'd deal with that after being inside a ship and out of Lah'mu.

They didn't take long to reach Kavya's ship, since they were walking fast and the ship wasn't far. It had a medium size and a dark-red coloration, although it seemed as dirty and old as those from the trophy hunters they'd put down in the forest.

Kavya opened the ship's door. "Come in, quick," she said. Phasma and Sarii just did what she said, entering the ship and instantly realizing that it was really tight there. "I know there's little room here, this ship wasn't made for three people to fit in, at least not three people awake and standing. But that's temporary."

Once again, Phasma didn't understand what Kavya could be talking about, but for some reason she got more distracted with Sarii at that moment. She was right at her side, and looked at her with guilt overflowing her gaze. "Who knows if those guys won't kill everyone?" she asked.

"That's not likely, trust me," Kavya replied. "They'll look for Phasma on the forest and when they don't find her, they'll contact Arman, their crew boss, and will leave the planet. It might get them in trouble if they attack too many innocent people… So they won't do anything. There would only be danger if you two came back to the village, because they might leave someone to spy or something. Arman tends to be precautious, Darios is the more aggressive one, you might have seen it for the group you had to take down.

"Which we wouldn't have made if you hadn't showed up," Phasma said, finally. Kavya turned to her. "You said you've been with the two crews and apparently you betrayed both of them, even killed those hunters so that they wouldn't catch me. Why are you helping me?"

Kavya didn't take a second to reply. "I need your help too."

"And why is that?" Phasma asked. Sarii, aside her, seemed to have the same doubt.

Kavya closed the ship's door, at last, seating in the pilot's seat to prepare to fly, but looking straightly at Phasma when she answered. "Because you're the only living person who knows how to survive on Parnassos."

* * *

ON LAH'MU:

That forest was one hell of a place to get easily lost within. Luckily, Dugs had a good sense of direction, and walked fast too, when they needed. It wasn't easy for him, then, to find the way back to his ship, and as soon as he reached it, he got his comm in his blue-colored hands to call Darios.

Although the forest was silent, he could bet Arman's crew was already on it or close to getting in, since Kavya, that little bastard, had betrayed Darios and apparently Arman too, to run with the trophy alone, putting everyone, especially him, in potential trouble.

"Hutzch, do you have her?" the holo with Darios's image appeared in front of the Dug. He took the deepest breath she could.

"We _almost_ got her. But Kavya arrived just in time to ruin it all. All of us who came here died trying to catch Phasma, by herself, by Kavya or a third woman who was with Phasma, we couldn't say who she is."

Even in the holo, anyone would be able to see how shocked Darios was at that moment. "That can't be true."

"Trust me, it is," Hutzch replied. "I was lucky to get out alive. The three of them must have flown away by now, and Arman's crew is probably here too already."

Darios punched something where he was. "Fine. Get the best ship and leave the others behind. Fly to Kessel and put together the rest of the crew. Call everyone. We'll keep on hunting them down, it's our only chance."

Hutzch only nodded, and Darios's holo then disappeared. The Dug, however, didn't enter any ship immediately; instead, he made another call, and, this time, a slender woman with long hair appeared on his comm.

"I was expecting your contact," she said, emotionless. "What do you have for me?"

"We couldn't catch her," Hutzch revealed. "One of ours betrayed the crew and took her on her own, along with another woman."

Different from Darios, the woman didn't outline any reaction. "Who was it that betrayed Darios?"

"Kavya, the girl he was using as a double agent," said Hutzch. "She didn't betray only Darios, but Arman too. We don't know where she's going with the trophy, but Darios wants to keep on hunting her, and Arman will probably do the same–"

"Well, go with them now," the woman interrupted. "You've been doing your job well. Keep me updated with any information and the promise of payment is still on."

Hutzch nodded once more. "I'm heading to Kessel to put together the remaining members of Darios's crew," he said, entering one of the ships and preparing to fly. "I'll call you again at anything new."

"So be it," said the woman, disappearing soon after.

* * *

ON THE UNKNOWN REGIONS:

As soon as she turned off her comm, she raced out of that room the fastest she could.

It was close to the evening, but the atmosphere made it look like it was always late night. She was used to that by then, but even if she wasn't, she would have time to pay attention to anything while she walked fast down the large old hallways of that building.

It wasn't really noisy there, not as it was in other areas of that same big place, where she would certainly hear screams, to which she was used as well. Right now, the only things she could hear were the sounds of the planet, far away, and the harsh words she would probably hear in a couple of minutes at most.

Finally, she reached a big door, and entered without announcing herself, due to the urgency of the conversation.

It was darker there than on the outside, because only a couple of candles were lighting a relatively big space. They were aside a big rustic chair. Or, she should say, _throne_, where a man sat comfortably, staring at a table in front of him, but deviated his eyes from it when the woman made herself noticeable.

"I'm sorry to interrupt… But I bring no good news," she said, finally. "She wasn't yet caught," she expected the man to say something, but he kept silent, forcing her to continue. "The two big crews of trophy hunters are still hunting her, though. I apologize for the inconvenient, in any case–"

She stopped when she heard him slightly laugh, which made her confused. "There's no need to apologize, doctor. Everything is going according to plan."

Still confused, she stared at him, imagining what could be going through his head, which she did ever since she'd met him. And, she believed, she would do that probably till the end of their days. "What do you mean?" she asked.

He looked at her again, without getting up from where he sat. "My dear, it's much better if the trophy hunters fight among themselves to find her. Let them do it as long as they wish… The more they compete to catch her, the less completion I'll have to catch her first."

By the end of his sentence, though, he wasn't looking at the woman anymore. Instead, his eyes were again focused on the table in front of the old throne, where, suspended in the air by the energy the table was handling, a metallic cube spun around, reflecting the flames from the candles.

A cube of carbonite.

* * *

Have I ever told you how much I love the way Sarii kinda sees the villagers as a kind of family? She's just too kind for this galaxy, but have no worries, she's tough when she has to be. You'll find that out eventually.

Any guess on what's going to happen next? Feel free to tell me in comments! Your comments make my day!

See you in the next chapter. May the Force be with you all during quaratine time!


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